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Kim Garnet
Kim Garnet was a fifteen-year-old high school student and girlfriend to Steve Walker. It was later discovered that Steve had been physically abusing her for months, though she kept this a secret from her friends and family, knowing that he would kill her if she told anyone. In 2009, she texted nude pictures of herself ("sexting") to Steve's phone (it highly hinted that Steve forced her to do the pictures as well as send them to him). But, in the process, she accidentally sent a copy to her friend, Ethan Morse, who has a crush on her. Realizing this, she went to Ethan's house in Little Neck to explain things, but Steve followed her and thought she was cheating on him. In retaliation, he beat her up after she left Ethan's house and stole her cell phone. Using the phone, he then sent copies of the pictures to several other students to humiliate Kim as well as keep her quiet. He also copied off his number to her own to make sure that no one would know that he sent them. Shortly thereafter, Kim fell down a flight of stairs at school, leaving her in a coma. Her doctor, Dr. Manning, noticed her previous injuries and called Detectives Elliot Stabler and Olivia Benson. After learning of her texting the pictures to both Steve and Ethan, detectives suspected one of them of beating her. Although Kim regained counsciousness, she refused to identify Steve as her abuser out of fear, simply saying that she fell. Kim herself is then charged by Family Court Counselor Samantha Copeland with distribution of child pronography in order to coerce her into identifying her abuser, much to the anger of the other detectives, especially Olivia. Instead of getting her to open up about her abuse, Copeland's actions make Kim lose any trust the SVU detectives had gained from her and she remains silent. The day before she was to appear in court, Steve beat her up again to keep her from naming him, breaking her arm in the process. After she remained silent in court about her attacker, Judge Hilda Marsden held her in contempt and put her in lock up for the night. Seeing that Copeland's methods are causing more harm to Kim than good, Olivia and Kim's attorney, Miranda Pond, bring Elliot's daughter, Kathleen Stabler to speak with her. The three women encourage Kim, telling her that keeping quiet isn't the way to solve her problems. Kathleen encourages her further, telling Kim about her own problems caused by her bipolar disorder as well as the realization that she would never be safe unless she took her life back. With renewed confidence, Kim finally admits to the events, stating that Steve is the one who's been abusing her and the one who stole her cellphone, which led to the events with the pictures. With her testimony in place, Steve is arrested and Copeland is ready to drop the charges against Kim. However, Judge Marsden denies the file for dismissal. Before Copeland or Pond can protest, Marsden finds Kim guilty of producing and distributing child pornography and sentences her to the Wellsburg Facility for Juvenile Sex Offenders in Wellsburg, Ohio for a year long imprisonment, shocking Olivia, Copeland, Pond and Kim's parents. As she is escorted out, a shattered Kim angrily blames the three women (Olivia, Copeland and Pond) for her fate, stating that she had trusted them and they had turned around and used her to get what they wanted. She also states that she now sees "telling the truth" will ''never ''ever help her feel safe again. An investigation lead by the SVU, Copeland and Pond soon find out that Judge Marsden had sent hundreds of teens to Wellsburg by turning their minor offenses into felonies (her cousin is the chief adminstrator in charge of the facility). In exchange for every new prisoner, Mardsen recieves large kickbacks of money. Judge Marsden was then exposed and arrested in a sting operation run by SVU with Copeland, Pond and Ethan's help and Kim's conviction was vacated by another judge and her record completely expunged, allowing her to be reunited with her parents and Ethan as well as begin a new life. (SVU: "Crush") Garnet, Kim Garnet, Kim